


What's so great about the Age of Sail?

by latin_cat, Sharpiefan



Category: Age of Sail - Fandom
Genre: Essays, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-14
Updated: 2012-11-14
Packaged: 2017-11-18 15:52:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,538
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/562763
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/latin_cat/pseuds/latin_cat, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sharpiefan/pseuds/Sharpiefan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This meta essay, my first, is the result of some recent debates between myself and latin_cat, that I thought I would put into type for the benefit of the wider AoS fandom community.</p>
<p>Written by Sharpiefan, with ideas inspired by latin_cat.</p>
            </blockquote>





	What's so great about the Age of Sail?

One of the things about the Age of Sail is that, as a fandom, it encompasses so much. If you are a Janeite (a Jane Austen fan), you are an Age of Sail fan. If you, like me, are a Sharpe fan, you come under the wider umbrella of the Age of Sail fandom. If you like Hornblower or POB, your place is assured.

A single person does not have to be a fan of everything that comes under the AoS umbrella in order to be an AoS fan. After all, there are plenty of people who read Jane Austen who would not even consider picking up a Sharpe novel, and loads of people who like Sharpe who cannot understand the finer points of Patrick O'Brian's prose.

You can like the Regency era - the fashions, the manners, the people, places and books, and be put off by the underside of life, the struggles, the poverty, the fighting. You can know all the ins and outs of Army uniforms, Army life, the battles, what Wellington was thinking when he did X, Y and Z and yet find yourself falling asleep when someone decides to read an excerpt of one of Jane Austen's novels. I am not saying this is common at all, I am merely stating that the possibility exists.

One of the things I adore about the Age of Sail universe is that the authors writing in it do not encroach on what other authors have written, or what happened historically, which leaves space for us as fanfic writers (and other authors) to fill in those gaps. To take two examples, one from a published author and one from a fanfic writer:

Historically speaking, at the Battle of Assaye, General Wellesley was unhorsed and surrounded by a mob of bloodthirsty Mahratta soldiers out for his blood. Events are unclear, but he must have defended himself and come away intact because he went on to fight in Portugal and Spain, ultimately facing Napoleon himself at the Battle of Waterloo. Bernard Cornwell spotted an opening to insert his own creation, Richard Sharpe, into the events of Assaye, allowing him to save the General's life, which led to his receiving a battlefield commission, setting him up very nicely for the rest of the Sharpe series.

My fandom example is the excellent [Both Sides of the Medal](http://archiveofourown.org/works/161799) by Sarlania, which takes an emotive scene from POB's _The Reverse of the Medal_ and asks 'What if this was witnessed by Horatio Hornblower'? Naval officers would have at least heard of each other, and it is not difficult to imagine Hornblower picking up the _Naval Gazette_ at some point in 1801 or 1802 to read of the amazing Lucky Jack Aubrey and the string of prizes with which he has filled the harbour while in command of the tiny brig _Sophie_. Equally,it is possible to imagine Aubrey discussing the far-off trial of the officers of HMS _Renown_ and the outcome of the trial: the confession of one Lieutenant Kennedy to pushing the Captain down the hold.

I have only come across an author mentioning another author's character by name twice, and one of those is an encounter pre-canon, while the other involves a minor character in the book that was published later. In Dudley Pope's book _Ramage_ the eponymous hero of the book recalls 'that whist-playing mathematician he once shared a berth with, Hornblower' and Bernard Cornwell mentions CS Forester's Rifleman Dodd, complete with his disappearance, and tells the reader in the Author's Note at the end that if the reader wants to find out what happened to Dodd, he has his own book, _Death to the French_ (I believe it was published as _Rifleman Dodd_ in America). These are the only two instances in print, but how many possibilities remain for the fanfic writer? And more, if the fanfic writer does not only concentrate on those representations of the Age of Sail that have appeared onscreen. 

_Correction of 10th February 2012_ : In Sails on the Horizon by Jay Worrall, Hornblower is mentioned by name, in an incident that takes place during Mr Midshipman Hornblower, shown on-screen in the episode The Duchess and the Devil - though of course neither of the versions from the Hornblower canon mention the characters in Worrall's book, as that was published later, in 2005. 

_Update of 14th November 2012:_ As of Julian Stockwin's _Betrayal_ going to print in October 2012, there is another book that references other AoS works, though this is more in the form of tidbits that will be noticed by those who read other AoS authors. I do not wish to spoil the book for anyone, but there are references to ships or characters from works by CS Forester, Dudley Pope and Alexander Kent. There may be others that I did not spot right away on first reading the novel.

It is because the authors respect each other's universes and creations enough to leave them alone that there are plenty of gaps for us as fanfic writers to come in and fill those gaps, exactly as Sarlania does in _Both Sides of the Medal_. Ramage has adventures in the Mediterranean and the West Indies. Hornblower has adventures in the West Indies, but at a later date. Jack Aubrey and his particular friend start out in the Mediterranean, and sail across the Atlantic and round the Horn to the Pacific. Drinkwater has adventures in the Baltic and the North Western Atlantic. Bolitho is another who is found in the West Indies. 

But none of those who voyage to the West Indies encounter the others, or take the same islands or have the same missions, even if they are there at the same time.

All our AoS Naval heroes are based, to some extent, upon historical figures. When in command of the brig _Sophie_ , Jack Aubrey fends off (and later captures) the much larger _Cacafuego_ , in an episode based on Cochrane's career when he was in command of _Speedy_. Ramage's taking of the Diamond Rock is based upon an event that happened under Commodore Hood. The authors of the books are very careful to keep their creations from having precisely the same adventures as any other (fictional) naval hero.

it is also striking how only four fictional Naval captains were at Trafalgar - and none of them was aboard one of the line-of-battle ships, or able to take part directly in the fighting. Bush, later Hornblower's First Lieutenant, was a Lieutenant aboard HMS _Temeraire_ , second-rate, but we do not witness his presence there first-hand.

Martin Jerrold is in a drunken stupor in the hold of his ship during the battle. Drinkwater is a prisoner aboard _Ville de Paris_ during the battle, and can take no part in the fighting. Ramage and Kydd both captain frigates and their role is solely to repeat signal during the battle, and to help with clearing up the aftermath. Of the two major AoS heroes who have enjoyed screen adaptations (Horatio Hornblower and Jack Aubrey respectively) neither is present at the battle.

The Age of Sail as a period covers all sorts of things, from the Georgian court-room of _Garrow's Law_ through to the Regency ballrooms and assemblies of Jane Austen, to the battlefields of Sharpe to the solitary frigate at sea of Hornblower and Aubrey, to the House of Commons as shown in _Amazing Grace_.

It covers a wide range in time: Garrow's Law and POTC are Georgian (I am going by what was seen in the first Pirates film; after that it is as much fantasy as anything else). Adaptations of Jane Austen's works seem to be set during the Regency (which, strictly speaking, ran from 1810, when King George III went incurably mad and his son was declared Regent, to 1821 when George III died and the Prince Regent became King George IV). The Sharpe series of novels opens in India in 1799 and closes in 1821. The Aubreyad causes headaches for its fans because of the everlasting year of 1813, and the Hornblower novels cause a headache for their fans because CS Forester wrote them out of sequence and contradicted himself with reference to his own character's age and date of birth.

The fandom covers a wide range of material: books (both recent novels and novels written at the time), films, TV series... even music. 

There are far more books and book series available to read than have ever been adapted for screen: the Ramage series by Dudley Pope, the Kydd novels by Julian Stockwin, the Bolitho books by Alexander Kent. There are TV series not based on any book whatsoever: _Garrow's Law_. There are recent screen adaptations and older ones, recent books and books contemporary with their settings. 

In short, there is something in the Age of Sail for everyone, and there are opportunities for every writer or vidder, or poet to produce their own work to unite strands of the whole, or fill in gaps in the canon, whatever that canon is.

And I think, in short, that is why I love the Age of Sail and, dare I say, why you love it too.

_(Essay edited and expanded 10th February 2012, and again 14th November 2012)_


End file.
